History Forum / General / British History / December 2006

I would like to point out a few things about the between wars
armament programs. First the Ten Year Rule was introduced by
Winston while he was Chancellor. It was changed to a Five Year
Rule in 1932 IIRC and abolished completely by 1936.

Naval building was limited by the various treaties. The 1930
London treaty extended gross tonnage limits to everything but
sloops limiting cruiser production. The 1936 treaty removed the
gross tonnage limits but kept the limits on individual size.
1936 also saw a general increase in orders for all sizes of ship.

The specifications that resulted in the Hurricane, Spitfire,
Halifax, Stirling and Lancanster were also issued in 1936.

1936 also saw the start of increasing sums being voted for new
armour for the Army. It was during this period that new machine
guns were being evaluated resulting in the Bren and the Besa.

In other words rearmament started under Baldwin and
accelerated under Chamberlain. When it comes to appeasement
most people seem to be using 100% hindsight. Practically all
politicians in 1938 had either served during WW1 or had
relatives who had. There was extreme reluctance to be involved
in another European war. Also until Hitler occupied the rump of
Czechoslovakia no reason to believe he would not keep his word.

Ken Young